Kessil

Jebao UV

Yeah, they probably don't work equally, but it's a matter if it works "good enough" for some people... I mean 320% price difference.

As for exposure, presumably you can slow the flow going into them? And if the units are in series such that one goes into another then it's basically identical to one long tube.
 
sfsuphysics said:
Yeah, they probably don't work equally, but it's a matter if it works "good enough" for some people... I mean 320% price difference.

As for exposure, presumably you can slow the flow going into them? And if the units are in series such that one goes into another then it's basically identical to one long tube.
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Maybe? But that's guesswork. Does a brief interruption interfere with how the UV sterilizes? Sure you can slow the flow, but if you slow it too much you don't get enough water turnover to be as effective either. Look I suspect that any UV sterilizer will work as a clarifier so if that's all you're shooting for go cheap. If you're using one though to sterilize and wipe-out populations of parasites, etc I wouldn't scrimp and use guesswork.
 
I’ve wondered a lot about lower power for longer time vs. higher power for shorter time and how they compare. Can’t say I’ve seen anything that enlightened me any about it though unfortunately.
 
From Pentair:
"offering approximately twice the UV lamp output when compared to standard low-pressure UV lamps of the same arc length."

SMART High-Output UV Sterilizers deliver optimum protection against harmful aquarium pathogens. They feature our high-output T6 style UV lamps, offering approximately twice the UV lamp output when compared to standard low-pressure UV lamps of the same arc length. With the increased UV output, SMART HO UV Sterilizers offer increased performance in a unit that requires less space. Each SMART HO UV Sterilizer model is designed to operate safely in wet environments and they are UL listed. SMART HO UV Sterilizers are designed for light commercial applications, filling the gap between our standard and commercial models.
 
Let's all agree that UV sterilizes the water. The question now is turn-over and recommendations. Obviously the more the turnover the better for parasites! However, no one manufacturer guarantees that it will scrub your aquarium clean of all parasites. Even BRS mentions that in a couple of their UV videos. BRS said it will "buy you some time" to address it.

I did a quick comparison to see if I can find any data and what is the recommended performance for parasites.

Jebao data is obscured and they don't have a manufacturer's website or I couldn't find it. So who knows who's making what and what factory it's coming from. I am not even sure why people on reef2reef rave about it! I remember going to jebao.com to find some support for my pump, which looks like an official website but it's just a distributor's/importer. They didn't provide any support and ask that I reach out to whoever I bought it from.

Aquatop is the same has no data or mention of parasite sterilization or any recommendations. Just a max flow, and recommended capacity. They said their product is suitable for saltwater, though.

Pentair bought out Emperor aquatics and all of it's UV equipment. The only data I can find on recommendation is on BRS and it's using OLD emperor aquatic data. Who knows if Pentair change their gear or went cheap! They still charge a premium though. I wouldn't use any of them because of old data. Pentair does have a MJ/cm² but no chart at what flow? What gives....

Coralife on the other hand has chart! This answers @Coral reefer question on power. Note that 3x = 9 watt, 6x = 18 and 12x = 36. More watt = more flow and more radiation.
1586240388895.png



Aqua Ultraviolet has the best recommendations. They have recommendations on REEF tanks and marine only tanks based on radiation and not flow. The flow is more improtant if you have a larger size tank! Which makes a lot of sense. You don't want to kill everything in a reef tank. So their recommendation is between 30k and 45k µW/cm² for reef tanks at 3-5x turnover.

1586240642333.png

Twist designs has no improvement over non-twist. Interesting...

I think I made up my mind. If I were to choose, I would choose coralife on the price. However, thanks to amazon and their bad reviews (with photo evidence), I decided not to go cheap and get an Aqua UV.

Thanks all. Feel free to keep arguing, err I mean debating! LOL.
 
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See this thread starting around post #28.

Tank Journal - No Tank

Just wondering, why would it be bad to put even less gph through the UV Sterilizer than suggested by the manufacturer? Is there a negative to UV sterilizer's working too well? I know the debate out there seems to be that they are un-necessary because they usually don't give a long enough...
www.bareefers.org
 
RandyC said:
See this thread starting around post #28.

Tank Journal - No Tank

Just wondering, why would it be bad to put even less gph through the UV Sterilizer than suggested by the manufacturer? Is there a negative to UV sterilizer's working too well? I know the debate out there seems to be that they are un-necessary because they usually don't give a long enough...
www.bareefers.org
Click to expand...

It’s just to show you how confusing this topic is. I just had a rollercoaster of decision making.

Jebao, no coralife or autotop, naw pentair, ohh coralife cause cool twist, ahhh aqua uv ugh!

Then now empowered with all this info brings up the effectiveness at Aqua UV recommended effectiveness for flow. @35k-40k does it do enough to kill parasites? Does running it higher have any negative effect on coral?

I don’t have any parasites now that I know of but maybe run it low now and turn it up when something shows up? So plan for future?

Should I run this with a flow meter? It seems like flow is very important. Flow meter will help prevents disaster too. No flow seems to blow up the unit if it’s running.

There’s no BRS video lol and there’s too much info out there.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Bruce Spiegelman said:
I'll bite. How do you know this?
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what UV is doing is it's damaging the DNA of whatever is going through it, so the only way a "short break" would "reset the clock" is if the creature in question could replicate or heal super fast in the time it took to go through the non-UV part. Which for something like bacteria is absolutely possible, they can replicate very fast, however for a more macroscopic sized and more complex creature like a parasite they simply can not heal that fast to reverse any potential damage that was done for the first ride through the system. It would be similar to you going out in the sun for 5 minutes, then going instead for a minute, and repeating that 12 times, it virtually is identical to you sitting in the sun for a full 60 minute stretch, your body can't heal up between UV exposure.
 
The Corallife units have a reputation of not being able to adequately kill Protozoa/parasites like Ich, but are good for clarification (killing bacteria that cloud the water). They are popular in freshwater, where clarification is often the end goal. The Turbo-twists are gimmicky in my opinion from a science/engineering perspective. If you have the same flow into and out of the tube, all the twisting does is make the water go faster because it has a longer path, not increase dwell/irradiation time (which is what matters). UV that is strong enough to kill parasites is strong enough to degrade plastic/PVC/etc, especially close the bulb, which also makes the twists suspect.

The comment that UV is UV is incorrect. There is a wide spectrum of UV, as wide as the visible spectrum, and different parts have different effects on killing living things, penetrating tissue, degrading materials, etc. I’m not saying this necessarily differentiates the brands (because I don’t know enough about the bulbs they use), just that it is something to be careful of, since 40w of a spectrum that isn’t very efficient at penetrating/killing won’t serve you as well as a proper spectrum. And the more lethal spectrum bulbs are more expensive and harder on building materials. Using quality building materials is important since UV radiation is very hard on them.

One of the big problems in UV sterilizers is that it’s hard to tell when they are being effective. Clarification is obvious, but killing of parasites/Protozoa isn’t at all. So you can either spend a lot of time researching the bulbs they use and their spectrum/lifetime/effect on housing materials/etc, just buy an inexpensive unit for clarification but know you probably aren’t helping fish diseases much, or spend more and buy and unit with a good reputation specifically designed and proven to kill parasites (because the tech is used for human water use).
 
I thought UV is UV is more or less correct because all UV sterilizers in the hobby use fluorescent tube technology, which quite literally is the same fluorescent tube that may be overhead in stores and what not, just without the phosphors coating on the inside. Fluorescent bulbs work by having mercury inside the tube which gets turned to a gas by the temperature/arc, then you get transitions of electrons in mercury that give off photons quite a few which are UV, hit the phosphor and to make visible photons and bam we see light not get cataracts. UV lights sterilizer bulbs just don't have that coating, so UV is UV that you get from them since all mercury electron transitions are the same. And I don't think anyone does LED UV for sterilization yet.

Now about all the contact time, etc, not going to argue that part.
 
JVU said:
The Corallife units have a reputation of not being able to adequately kill Protozoa/parasites like Ich, but are good for clarification (killing bacteria that cloud the water). They are popular in freshwater, where clarification is often the end goal. The Turbo-twists are gimmicky in my opinion from a science/engineering perspective. If you have the same flow into and out of the tube, all the twisting does is make the water go faster because it has a longer path, not increase dwell/irradiation time (which is what matters). UV that is strong enough to kill parasites is strong enough to degrade plastic/PVC/etc, especially close the bulb, which also makes the twists suspect.

The comment that UV is UV is incorrect. There is a wide spectrum of UV, as wide as the visible spectrum, and different parts have different effects on killing living things, penetrating tissue, degrading materials, etc. I’m not saying this necessarily differentiates the brands (because I don’t know enough about the bulbs they use), just that it is something to be careful of, since 40w of a spectrum that isn’t very efficient at penetrating/killing won’t serve you as well as a proper spectrum. And the more lethal spectrum bulbs are more expensive and harder on building materials. Using quality building materials is important since UV radiation is very hard on them.

One of the big problems in UV sterilizers is that it’s hard to tell when they are being effective. Clarification is obvious, but killing of parasites/Protozoa isn’t at all. So you can either spend a lot of time researching the bulbs they use and their spectrum/lifetime/effect on housing materials/etc, just buy an inexpensive unit for clarification but know you probably aren’t helping fish diseases much, or spend more and buy and unit with a good reputation specifically designed and proven to kill parasites (because the tech is used for human water use).
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I don’t understand your comments on the twists parts...
Wouldn’t the same flow rate with a longer path(the spiral twists) result in longer dwell time/exposure to the bulb? I don’t understand how you say it makes it go faster?
Also I thought the twists are made of quartz? Have you taken one apart to see if it’s plastic or quartz? Most units use quartz to separate the bulb and the water.
 
Coral reefer said:
I don’t understand your comments on the twists parts...
Wouldn’t the same flow rate with a longer path(the spiral twists) result in longer dwell time/exposure to the bulb? I don’t understand how you say it makes it go faster?
Also I thought the twists are made of quartz? Have you taken one apart to see if it’s plastic or quartz? Most units use quartz to separate the bulb and the water.
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Regarding twisting: No, if the flow of water going in/out of the unit is the same, and the volume is the same, all the twisting does is increase the path length the same amount of water has to travel in the same amount of time, so it travels faster but gets to the outflow at the same time. Same total dwell/irradiation time. If one unit of water enters and exits every second, and the housing holds 10 units, each unit of water is exposed to UV for an average of 10 seconds. Doesn’t matter how many twists/turns you put each unit of water through during those 10 seconds. It does matter how close the units of water are to the UV bulb for those 10 seconds, but as far as I know the twisting doesn’t affect that.

Regarding the material of the twist: I don’t know, but it would surprise me if it was an expensive crystalline material given the pricing, and because you don’t hear about them shattering like you do with the bulbs.
 
Coral reefer said:
Seems like it would hold a higher volume of water with the twists. Aren’t you just assuming they hold the same volume?
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I’m saying that given the same volume, the twists don’t help at all. There’s no reason to think that the twists would or should allow a larger volume. If anything, slightly less volume because the twisting material takes up some volume. The trade-off of a larger volume is longer dwell time but less average irradiation intensity since the water can be further away from the bulb as the diameter increases. This would be the same twist or no twist.

Also looking at their diagrams, the twist material looks like it may be an opaque material, not sure if that’s just artistic license, but if it’s true that is even more reason to stay away because the the twist material would absorb a large fraction of the UV irradiation, on the order of half, since only the photons going nearly straight out would hit water, the ones exiting the bulb at angles would hit the twisting material instead.

I called the company just now and asked about the twist material since I couldn’t find anything online. The tech support person told me it is made of the same opaque durable plastic material the housing is made of. So yeah, it will block the UV light that hits it reducing the total UV hitting water without any advantages in dwell time. FWIW their tech support was very friendly and helpful, with no wait time- so at least that is a plus for the company in my opinion.

Additionally, I just think the twist is at least partly dishonest/manipulative, for marketing purposes, taking advantage of people’s incorrect intuition about this sort of thing. I don’t like it when manufacturers do this, and it makes me wonder what else they are lying about.
 
JVU said:
I’m saying that given the same volume, the twists don’t help at all. There’s no reason to think that the twists would or should allow a larger volume. If anything, slightly less volume because the twisting material takes up some volume. The trade-off of a larger volume is longer dwell time but less average irradiation intensity since the water can be further away from the bulb as the diameter increases. This would be the same twist or no twist.

Also looking at their diagrams, the twist material looks like it may be an opaque material, not sure if that’s just artistic license, but if it’s true that is even more reason to stay away because the the twist material would absorb a large fraction of the UV irradiation, on the order of half, since only the photons going nearly straight out would hit water, the ones exiting the bulb at angles would hit the twisting material instead.

I called the company just now and asked about the twist material since I couldn’t find anything online. The tech support person told me it is made of the same opaque durable plastic material the housing is made of. So yeah, it will block the UV light that hits it reducing the total UV hitting water without any advantages in dwell time. FWIW their tech support was very friendly and helpful, with no wait time- so at least that is a plus for the company in my opinion.

Additionally, I just think the twist is at least partly dishonest/manipulative, for marketing purposes, taking advantage of people’s incorrect intuition about this sort of thing. I don’t like it when manufacturers do this, and it makes me wonder what else they are lying about.
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I don’t agree with you on how this works. I’ll take one apart and see for sure when I get a chance.
There is now way it opaque between the bulb and the water. I think the opaque plastic just directs the water around the bulb (which must have a quartz sleeve around it) but is open on the side facing the bulb. There are definitely older and newer versions so things could have changed over time.
Assuming volume isn’t practical imo since all units will differ there. What it does do is make sure you have an even dwell time for all water that goes through the unit rather than other units that just have an open unobstructed area around the quartz sleeve. In that scenario how do we know if all water stays inthere the same amount of time? Seems like there would be an uneven path of least resistance where most water could move through quickly but some would be lingering longer uncertain areas.
This would also likely be effected by postion of the unit itself (ie horizontal vs. vertical installation) and the orientation of the inlets and outlets.
Some have a single pass with inlet on one side and outlet on the opposite side. Some have I let and outlet on the same end and force water past the bulb one way then back down again to get out.
Certainly not all are created equal.
 
Thanks John. Appreciate the fact-based and professional opinion and the homework you did on this. Sometime we should consider a sticky on "tech" knowledge like this that draws a reasonable conclusion. This is one of those subjects that just keeps coming up.
 
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